Jamshed Boman Homi Wadia (13 September 1901 â€" 4 January 1986),
commonly referred to as J. B. H. Wadia, was a prominent Bollywood
movie director, screenwriter, producer and founder of Wadia Movietone
Studio. He was born in prominent Parsi family which hailed from Surat,
Gujarat whose ancestral business was ship building. Their family name
of Wadia stands for master shipbuilders. In a family of entrepreneurs
Wadia is credited with creation of movies involving populist stunt
roles including those by Fearless Nadia and bringing concept of stunt
actresses in Indian cinema.Wadia began his film making career with
silent movies. Being an intellectual and avid writer he wrote scripts
for his movies while his younger brother Homi Wadia who joined him in
the business a few years later was usually tasked with directing them.
He produced his first movie Vasant Leela in 1928, along with 11 other
silent movies at the Kohinoor Studios in Dadar as well as under Deware
Laboratories. These movies were modest successes and were mostly
remakes of populist Hollywood classics. In the year 1933 he founded
Wadia Movietone company and made his first Talkie movie Lal-E-Yaman,
inspired by the Orientalist fantasy world espoused by the Arabian
Nights and related themes. This movie's success helped establish Wadia
Movietone as a studio to contend with, in partnership with his brother
Homi, their distributor Manchesa B Billimoria and the Tata brothers
Burjore and Nadirshaw.Under the Wadia Movietone Studio banner Wadia
introduced a variety of new concepts to Indian cinema starting with a
stunt actress playing a leading role to a documentary newsreel,The
Indian Gazette, to a feature-length documentary, Haripura Congress. As
part of capturing cinematic recordings of early classical and
semi-classical musicians and singers he made a series titled Wadia
Movietone's Variety Programme, featuring legendary artistes such as
Feroz Dastur, Bal Gandharva, Malika Pukhraj and Pandit Tirthankar.
Wadia Movietone was also the first to create an Indian film without
songs, Nav Jawan, the first Indian movie to be filmed in English
(along with parallel Hindi and Bengali versions), The Court Dancer,
the first Sindhi-language movie post-Partition, Ekta, and the very
first Indian television series, Hotel Taj Mahal.
commonly referred to as J. B. H. Wadia, was a prominent Bollywood
movie director, screenwriter, producer and founder of Wadia Movietone
Studio. He was born in prominent Parsi family which hailed from Surat,
Gujarat whose ancestral business was ship building. Their family name
of Wadia stands for master shipbuilders. In a family of entrepreneurs
Wadia is credited with creation of movies involving populist stunt
roles including those by Fearless Nadia and bringing concept of stunt
actresses in Indian cinema.Wadia began his film making career with
silent movies. Being an intellectual and avid writer he wrote scripts
for his movies while his younger brother Homi Wadia who joined him in
the business a few years later was usually tasked with directing them.
He produced his first movie Vasant Leela in 1928, along with 11 other
silent movies at the Kohinoor Studios in Dadar as well as under Deware
Laboratories. These movies were modest successes and were mostly
remakes of populist Hollywood classics. In the year 1933 he founded
Wadia Movietone company and made his first Talkie movie Lal-E-Yaman,
inspired by the Orientalist fantasy world espoused by the Arabian
Nights and related themes. This movie's success helped establish Wadia
Movietone as a studio to contend with, in partnership with his brother
Homi, their distributor Manchesa B Billimoria and the Tata brothers
Burjore and Nadirshaw.Under the Wadia Movietone Studio banner Wadia
introduced a variety of new concepts to Indian cinema starting with a
stunt actress playing a leading role to a documentary newsreel,The
Indian Gazette, to a feature-length documentary, Haripura Congress. As
part of capturing cinematic recordings of early classical and
semi-classical musicians and singers he made a series titled Wadia
Movietone's Variety Programme, featuring legendary artistes such as
Feroz Dastur, Bal Gandharva, Malika Pukhraj and Pandit Tirthankar.
Wadia Movietone was also the first to create an Indian film without
songs, Nav Jawan, the first Indian movie to be filmed in English
(along with parallel Hindi and Bengali versions), The Court Dancer,
the first Sindhi-language movie post-Partition, Ekta, and the very
first Indian television series, Hotel Taj Mahal.
Share this
SUBSCRIBE OUR NEWSLETTER
SUBSCRIBE OUR NEWSLETTER
Join us for free and get valuable content delivered right through your inbox.